Eye of the Shadow - Pt. 4 - A Little More Light

A Little More Light

Early Morning - Lower City - Taris

That guy is really, really good.

Yagr had been watching the Sith guard for over an hour from his hide. The lower city had so many delightfully shadowy spots that Yagr was never at a loss for hideaways. This particular guard did his job very well--keeping a close watch at the possible threat vectors, randomizing his watch pattern, repositioning often to force aggressors to alter approach options.

Zaerdra's forger got Sith access documents for the Undercity; they must be planning to strike the Vulkars through the tunnels. They can't be planning on snatching that Jedi. That isn't Thek's style. He has no love for Brejik and his gang, but that just isn't his way. What is that crazy old knob up to? Well, they are going to need some help getting under. Thek is one of the few decent people on this crappy world. If he thinks something is worth getting involved with, then I guess it is worth my effort to help him.

Yagr slid noiselessly out of his hiding place and over the railing that bounded the catwalk from the gaping shaft leading to the Undercity far below. He effortlessly hand-walked his way along a pipe to a point just below the location of the Sith sentry. Using nothing but his upper body, the hunter propelled himself through the air and landed directly behind the guard before he was even aware of the danger. As the guard turned to face the noise, Yagr had wrapped his arms around the helmet and murderously wrenched the guard's head. The shattering vertebrae emitted more sound than Yagr was hoping for, but no one wandered the walkways at this hour. The guard was dragged into a dark corner and stripped without anyone around to take notice.

He slipped into deep thought as he began to separate the body from its armor. Too bad He thought. The kid was young, probably full of optimism, too. Should have chosen his side more carefully. He might still have been dead from some other fate, but at least he would have died for a better cause. Yagr always felt a bit philosophic after a kill. He hated death; it was the enemy of what he loved. But to love something means to hate something else.

The Council just never understood that. If you love the light, you have to hate the dark. Bindo was ALWAYS right about that. It isn't emotion or love that leads to the dark side. It is unrestrained passion. They should be teaching those kids with their flaming hormones how to control their passions and emotions instead of suppressing them like Lamar. A parent can't always say 'no' without explaining why from time to time. Too bad nobody has ever come looking for my opinion on how the Council was being run.

Yagr finished donning the Sith armor. Luckily, this victim's bowels had not let go like so many who Yagr had reached out and touched; it only made his victims that much more pitiable.

The woman and her companion walked casually towards the turbolift entry leading to the Undercity. They appeared to have a certain confidence that led the stray observer to assume that they had every right to be crossing a security check point even though their attire bore no resemblance to Sith personnel. They handed their access document to the guard who glanced over it momentarily then gestured to the door. As the entry door slid shut, the guard darted off into the shadows, unnoticed.

Zaerdra needs to get a new forger. Wow, that copy was awful. But more importantly, what was a massively-force sensitive 'potential' Jedi doing with a Republic officer heading to the Undercity? In the service of the Hidden Beks, presumably. Noids and Droids! That makes no sense. Shifting his thought pattern slightly... My stars, she was beautiful and...elegant?...Is that the word? She moved with so much confidence and poise. She is no padawan or novice. But she does not seem to emanate anything like a Jedi. Who in the Force is she?

Zaerdra stepped into her own apartment and was preparing to slide out of her clothes and into the fresher. The overnight watch was a beast on the senses, but perhaps she could get some sleep before the coming events caught up to her. She would need her utmost concentration.

As her garments fell from her shoulders, she noticed something. That smell, its...

'Do you always undress with an audience, Zae?' She spun around aiming her holdout at a deep shadow beside the entry door with one hand, clutching her clothing in an effort of modesty with the other.

'Ugh!...Yagr... You are such a rycrit snout!'

Yagr chuckled at the derogatory remark. 'I thought I had been called almost everything. That is a new one.' He turned on his sarcastic tone, 'It makes me feel so unloved, and I don't even know what it means.'

'A rycrit shoves its snout into the crotch of another rycrit to get an idea of what kinds of food can be found in the area. Since you have suddenly appeared, you must be sniffing for info to feed on....again.' She huffed as she tried to maneuver back into her clothing without revealing too much.

'Modest gangsters, I love it. In fact, there are quite a few things around these parts don't seem to match up. Like Republican officers and underworld types. I don't quite get that. Can you help a fellow out?'

'You always show up the same way... sneaking in scaring the breath out of me.'

'I would figure that after the fourth time you would have started to increase your alertness, even after a long night on duty. So, can you give me a hand figuring things out around here?'

'Since when has our business been your business? You just lurk around stirring up trouble then slinking away when it gets too hot.'

That stung a little. He respected the Hidden Beks' number two and wished he could reveal to her all that he had done for them so that they might share some mutual respect. The Tarisian organizations that had any knowledge of him just thought of him as a lurker, an assassin, or a nuisance. They didn't see the agenda just below the surface of things. Indeed, his respect for Zaerdra bordered on admiration, and he often considered sharing his identity and purpose with her.

'Listen, Beautiful...' Her lekku twitched slightly at the endearment. 'Not many people around here can grasp this, but I think you can. There is something very big going on around us. Bigger than Beks and Vulkars. Bigger than Sith on Taris. Bigger than Malak versus the Republic. I can feel it. Sense it. But I don't know what 'IT' is. I feel like that woman going under is a part of it, and I need to help her. And, I guess that means I am helping you.'

Zaerdra sat down with a slump under the weight of what she heard. She looked hard at the man sitting on the floor in the corner, little visible light touching his face but the occasional glow of his cigara. She inhaled deeply, briefly letting the aroma take her mind back to the first time they had met. Since then, the speculation about him (which was all anyone had, nobody really 'knowing' anything) was that he was a killer for hire and a self-obsessed freelancer. His few sentences seemed to shatter some of that myth. Apparently, he was no mindless killer, but he never made an attempt to deny or alter anyone's impression of himself. Just kept doing his thing, whatever that was.

She always got tingly around truly effective people, and Yagr got things done when he wanted them done. Though she knew little about him, she liked him--liked him a lot. But what made him tick? Maybe she didn't want to know.

She wore a thoughtful expression for a minute then broke the silence by saying, 'Come back in an hour.' The visitor nodded and rose to leave. 'Are you going to slink out the way you got in?' A wry smile spread across her face. He paused, tossing a playful look at her, 'No, I'll just use the door this time.'

After getting a change of clothes and some breakfast, Zaerdra walked to the command room. Current events had overtaken her window of opportunity for sleep. A security officer was standing beside her desk with a fresh-looking Yagr sitting in the chair opposite hers, his feet propped casually on her desk. As she watched him, it occurred to her that this was the first time she had ever seen his face in clear light.

This must be pretty important for him to reveal himself so completely like this.

He looked up at her as she approached from his right and she noticed for the first time the cybernetic eye that focused on her. He was...a handsome man...not really the kind of face that would make you take a second look, but his features, his eye... or eyes...whatever, his lips...he just looks like he has a grip on it all. Like he would do anything you need and succeed at it with...style. Yeah... style... that's the word for him. He just has style. In another life, he might have been a man of importance on Coruscant with impeccable taste in clothes and music. But the eye...it's not that uncommon, but his is...it's fascinating to look at. The subtle changes and variations in the look of it. Simply fascinating.

Zaerdra pulled her eyes away from Yagr. Okay, back to reality. Her momentary mental recreation was over and she was back to business.

Yagr had felt her coming. Not with the force; no, that skill was long gone. He just noticed the little things. The guard shifting. The gentle grinding sound of her boots on the floor, it was an authoritative stride. Her aroma...it filled the room the moment she entered. It was a gentle, inviting scent. Too bad she found it necessary to cloak what she was in suspicion and cynicism. He might have loved her in a different time and place. Perhaps it was because of this that he had decided to reveal so much of himself to her by openly appearing in the fully lit scene of the command post. He noticed her pause as he turned to look at her with both optic devices, biotic and cybernetic.

'Hiya, whatcha got for me?' was his casual but purposeful greeting.

'Gadon is on his way' was her simple and guarded response.

The door behind the desk opened and Gadon Thek stepped through. The leader of the Hidden Bek gang could have passed for a scholar in some of the great libraries of the Galaxy, but fate had handed him leadership of a mediocre gang in the bowels of a mediocre planet. Fate has a strange sense of humor, and a bond existed between Gadon and Yagr that went beyond swapping cybernetic eyeball tips.

No one, absolutely no one on this planet or any other knew as much about the life of Yagr than Gadon Thek.

Yagr rose at Thek's entry and moved towards the old gangster with outstretched arms. Zaerdra and the security officer reached for their weapons on instinct, but relaxed when Gadon grabbed the approaching man in a warm and friendly embrace.

'Grym Yagr, what is a filthy slinker like you doing around my shop?' Gadon smiled. 'I didn't think you came out of your hole when things were this thick.' A punch in the shoulder accompanied the jibe.

'Gadon, I was made for these times.' Yagr said with his own smile. Zaerdra noticed that the smile vanished very quickly, replaced by something else. Perhaps if he had possessed two natural eyes she might have read the pain that wiggled to the surface of his psyche. 'I mean it, Gadon, this is what I am all about.'

He slipped a small box into Gadon's hand. 'This one is special. You got the good one. My prototype was a bit buggy.' Gadon opened the box to reveal a small glowing orb. It had a bluish tint to it with a faint purple fluctuation in the illumination. 'You will be able to pick up the darkies with this.' Thek nodded and snapped the box shut. He would try on his new implant later. Business, first.

'If you wanted to talk business, why didn't you come to me first instead of going through Zaerdra?' Thek motioned to the chair as he spoke.

Yagr took his seat before replying , again with a smile. 'Cause she is so much easier on the eyes, and looks significantly better in her....' Yagr stopped the sentence remembering where he was, and noticing the icy daggers coming from the Twi'lek's eyes. 'Ok, serious now....'

'You want to know about the two that I sent down stairs, right?' Yagr nodded. 'Well, I am sure you realize that they are Republic and that they are after the Jedi. I chose to help them because the Vulkars have her. If they rescue her, then I am benefited by a massive Vulkar loss of prestige.' Thek sat back satisfied with his explanation.

Yagr frowned at the half-truth. 'Aaaaaand.......?'

Thek glanced at Zaerdra before continuing. 'Okay, and I need this woman to ride for me. My rider was roasted by the Vulkars and I need this win. I don't have a good read on her yet, but I got a gut feeling about her. You know she has burned over a dozen Sith and perhaps two dozen Vulkars. She and that Onasi guy have been making quite a stir around here. My gut tells me she has to get this jedi and she has to get off this planet. I think she might be jedi, herself, but isn't showing it to anyone. The pilot fellow called her 'Sareena', or something like that.'

Yagr's face lost all expression. His mind turned inside out as it was engulfed with memory. Come on...lots of women in the Galaxy with that name, no doubt. Women with purpose and destiny....suuuuuure.....women at the very epicenter of events in the Galaxy. Eh...can't be her. He pushed aside that thought as quickly as it had arrived.

'Noids and droids,' he murmured to himself. 'So, what's your...their...whoever's plan?'

'Hook up with Mission in the Undercity. Infiltrate the Vulkar base. Snatch the accelerator. Maybe deal with Kandon while they are down there. She comes back, wins the swoop race, and frees the jedi. Done. What do you think?'

'Oh, sounds simple. Except for Rancors, tunnels full of Gamorreans, rakghouls, Sith patrols, Vulkar security droids, Kandon and his crew, surviving AND winning the swoop race with no apparent experience...aside from all that, it sounds like a good plan.' Yagr looked down and shook his head. 'I guess this is where I come in.'

'You lookin' to be somebody's hero again?' Thek asked with a twinkle in his eye.

'Like I said, this is what I was made for.' Yagr stood ready to reenter the shadow world. 'Do you have a plan for getting off of this world?'

'No, hadn't really thought about it. Won't the Sith leave when the jedi is off the planet?'

'Think that through, Gadon. What will the Sith do if they think the jedi might slip through their fingers? With this much effort being invested into the search for one person, who do you think is up there managing these operations? Malak is up there, probably Karath with him. If they think they might lose the jedi, they will trash this planet, Gadon. Get a plan together, fast.' Yagr glanced over at Zaerdra with an insistent look. A 'hurry-up and do this because I don't want to lose you' kind of a look.

As Yagr moved quickly to the exit, the door slid open and he nearly plowed over a diminutive blue Twi'lek. Yagr slew to the side, just missing her.

'Hey, watch it, buddy!' The Twi'lek spouted with her usual attitude.

'Sorry, Mis....miss. I beg your pardon.'

'Hey, aren't you the janitor at the Upper City Cantina?' This question prompted a grin from Gadon Thek, who had wandered within earshot of the exchange. The reference to one of Yagr's information-gathering identities was cause for a chuckle. This guy is everywhere.

'Uh...yeah...just one of the odd jobs to keep food on the table...sorry for my clumsiness.' Yagr's shift in personality was flawless as he became a lowly, common laborer to someone who need not know what dangers lurked in the eye of the shadow. The 'janitor' sheepishly loped off down the corridor to fulfill his own agenda, while the little Twi'lek turned an inquiring eye toward the Bek bosses.